By their very nature, fantasy worlds are rich in fantastic visuals. This is hampered somewhat by the fact that there is no visual component to the classic tabletop game, which leads to odd conversations like the one above.

Was intro’d to your comic this week. Brilliant! I was laughing so hard, the girl in the next room thought I was choking. Looking forward to the next comic and to any further series you choose to do. kepp up the hilarious work!

Long time reader, first time poster. Absolutley fantastic job and thank heavens I’ve learned (the hard way) not to drink my coffee when reading this site or today would have cost the company another keyboard….

What’s particulary funny is…the DM is wrong too! ‘Corsairs’ are the pirates themselves…you might say ‘corsairs’ when you really mean ‘corsair ships’ but it’s not a particular kind of sailing vessel. I’d never seen the “classic gazebo joke” but the same joke appeared in the “Knights Of the Dinner Table” game comic.

I’m no expert on sailing ships, but I’m pretty sure galleons were bigger, with square sails. That joke is that Legolas thinks all sailing ships are galleons, which is kinda like saying that all automobiles are SUVs. I couldn’t tell you what the ships in the film are, but they look decidedly eastern to me, while galleons were western.

You are doing an outstanding job! I have enjoyed the whole series so far and don’t want it to end even though it is obviously close to an end. I hope we get more great work in the future. Great strip by the way, the one with the skulls trap is still my favorite.

Not sure I’ve posted before, been reading a while. Great comic, I love it! I’ve had my own gazebo moment as a DM back in high school. The party opened a door onto a room with a chest on the ground on the far side. The room had a green poisonous gas in it as well, which I described as “You see a tint in the air of the room”. I don’t recall the exact dialog at this point, but the party thought it was a tent instead. They thought they had found a magic tent and rushed into the room to figure it out. They were astounded when I asked them to make a save vs poison. Pretty amusing, particularly since I didn’t understand their mistake until they asked whether the tent had attacked them or something.

That’s not really a gazebo moment. Your players just misheard you. A true gazebo moment is when they heard you fine, but have no idea what the word you just used means and try to guess rather than ask.

hehe, confused conversations…
Player: So we going to kill this so and so wizard?
Dm: No that’s the good wizard from town.
Player: So why’s a good wizard trying to take over a dragon?
Dm: He’s not; the evil wizard so and so is trying to take over the celestial dragon.
Player: That’s not the same guy?
Other Player: Why would an evil guy want to take over an evil dragon? Wouldn’t they want to team up to kill us?
Dm: I hate this campaign.

Whoa–I pulled up the comic and the first thing that caught my attention, before even getting to read any dialogue, was a dinasaur and that weird leopard-thing, and I was all huh??? So I actually read it and… it all made sense! Amazing!

(cleaning monitor of water after seeing Gimli’s “below the fold / under the camera” comment)

Yeah, I know … don’t drink while reading DMotR.

Just wanted to add another Corsair to Susano’s list (# 21). In the Robert Conrad TV series “Black Sheep Squadron (or Baa Baa Black Sheep if you prefer) from the 70’s, the pilots flew Corsairs in the Pacific Theater of World War II.

KING OF THE KINGS!!!!!!!!
I haven’t laughed so hard in quite some time. This one was absolutely brilliant, particularly the part about Starcraft (where did you get that screenie? Battlestar Galactica) and the DM saying “I hate this campaign”.

Version of the “gazebo” joke that I originally heard (though I was led to believe this actually happened), was the “Portuguese” joke. The party was blocked from entering a castle by a Portuguese. They try talking to it, going around it, moving it aside, finally attacking it, all to no avail. Turs out the DM meant to say “Portcullis”.

While I don’t have a dictionary handy to make this irrefutable, the original meaning of the word “corsair” was “pirate”. A corsair could travel in a galleon, a frigate, a caravel, or even a dinghy — the title of the job (I use the term “job” loosely here) was ‘corsair’. It had nothing to do with whatever mode of transport he chose. Later on, though, the word was used for many vehicles. I believe it comes from the French.

OK, I went onto Wiktionary and got this. I hope you are all suitably edified while I go and mend my glasses with some masking tape.

corsair (plural corsairs)
Etymology
From French corsaire, from French lettre de course, alternative term for letter of marque.

A French privateer, especially from the port of St-Malo
A privateer or pirate in general
1840 “If I had been born a corsair or a pirate, a brigand, genteel highwayman or patriot — and they’re the same thing,” thought Mr. Tappertit, musing among the nine-pins, “I should have been all right. But to drag out a ignoble existence unbeknown to mankind in general — patience! I will be famous yet. “” Charles Dickens, Barnaby Rudge, [Chapter 34.]
The ship of privateers or pirates, especially of French nationality
Turkish Corsair: A barbary pirate, or barbary pirate ship (from Algeria, which was nominally in the Ottoman (Turkish) Empire).
A nocturnal assassin bug of the genus Rasahus, found in the southern USA.
F4U Corsair: A World War II fighter aircraft.

Lol. The classic gazebo joke. Reminding all GMs to describe the ships, then call them corsairs. Do it the other way around, and pretty soon they’ll be rolling initiative and attacking inanimate objects. Lucky for them that the ships are full of nasties to kill. ^_^

I never thought about it before, but isn’t the land of Minas Tirith mountainous? Doesn’t that mean these ships are sailing upstream?

Al said:
Just wanted to add another Corsair to Susano's list (# 21). In the Robert Conrad TV series “Black Sheep Squadron (or Baa Baa Black Sheep if you prefer) from the 70's, the pilots flew Corsairs in the Pacific Theater of World War II.
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Yes indeed. In the narrative they made only slow progress until the wind turned in their favor. The “change in the wind” was noticed by Frodo, the mountain men, Leolas, and others in different parts of the world but at the same time. It was one of the devices that Tolkien used to tie the events together as the fellowship went its many separate ways.

Regarding those who thought Gimli was speaking in frame 8…notice that the text is in the same yellow boxes used by the DM. Gimli thought a corsair is a dinosaur; he’s sure not going to come up with the right answer two seconds later. The DM is the one that set them straight.

The DM’s “I hate this campaign” is the first time i have laughed out loud at this comic, sure other have mad grin or even a sort of snorting inside laugh but this litteraly had me in stitches. Increbile comic Shamus

Man, I hate it when work drags me out of town and it takes me this long to catch the comic. Then I end up posting at the bottom, looking like a slacker! I’m glad I checked in though, it’s great today. Panel 9 is great, with Gimli’s bubble popping up from below.